


Dissident

by blueinkblot



Category: Ready Player One (2018)
Genre: F/M, fem!reader - Freeform, you're a tech person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-21
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-06-14 03:26:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15379635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueinkblot/pseuds/blueinkblot
Summary: After being banned from working in technology, your job prospects are a bit... lacking.And then you catch the eye of a certain tech CEO...





	1. Chapter 1

“Are you all alone?”  
You looked up into a pair of glowing, golden eyes.  
“Evening, Mr. Sorrento,” you said with a sigh, dropping your gaze to the table. “Yeah, it looks like I got stood up.”  
You held up a holographic card with the OASIS user identity of the user you were supposed to meet, and then tucked it into a pocket on your jumpsuit.  
“What are you doing here?”  
The CEO seemed surprised and shrugged. “What are any of us doing? Escaping reality.”  
You snorted. “Isn’t that the truth.”  
He sat down opposite you in the booth. “Since you seem to know so much about me, who are you? What do you do?”  
“Well, I’m (username). I _used_ to be an electrical engineering student at OTech before I was kicked out.”  
“OTech is the best school for electrical engineering in the country.”  
“I know.”  
“Why’d you get kicked out?”  
“I was one of the founders of Dissident.”  
He goggled at you. IOI, through him, had thrown a fit when there were OTech students who didn’t want to work at IOI and instead tried to start their own technology company - Dissident Technology. The nine of you had kind of meant the name as a “fuck you” to IOI, and the university had shut Dissident down with help from Ohio legislators. IOI had taken the nine of you to court, and though your defense attorney had argued trustbusting legislation the IOI lawyers were too good and you got barred from working in technology since.  
But that didn’t mean that you _hadn’t_ been doing tech work.  
“But… why?”  
You sighed. “There was a group of us who wanted to make good technology - ”  
“Meaning IOI’s is bad?”  
You snorted, putting your drink down. “No, only cheap and motivated by money. You’re putting out new products on a constant basis. Did you know six of my eight cofounders were coders?”  
Sorrento looked guilty. “No.”  
“We wanted to put out more software patches than hardware and fix products on the run. _Completely_ different from IOI! Hell, in our _early_ OTech days, we were mostly repairing _your_ shit. I know your eighth-vers goggles better than your techs, I bet.”  
Those eighth-vers goggles were more like what used to be called “virtual reality” - came about in the 2010s - and were much heavier than the lighter versions of today.  
He said nothing, simply staring at you for a moment, before pulling you in quickly and kissing you hard.  
You only wished you could actually feel it.  
You supposed you could feel the kiss itself, and that was a lot considering that you’d _made_ the mandibular sensors that you were wearing. You couldn’t feel a lot, but you knew that Sorrento was most likely wearing the most recent suit IOI had put out.  
You reached out until you felt his waist and slid your hand down his jacket. He jerked at your touch and you chuckled into the kiss. Since your eyes were closed, you couldn’t tell if he responded to your teasing beyond what was under your hands.  
You rested your hand on his thigh and he slid forward on the seat, putting him near you with you nearly straddling his other thigh. You slid your hand up his thigh and he pulled back for breath, breathing hard and eyes wide.  
“What are you doing?”  
You fluttered your eyelashes, trying to look as innocent as possible. “What do you mean?”  
“Are you trying to _seduce_ me?”  
You threw your head back and laughed, taking a sip from your drink. “Hell no. You started the kiss, I was just having a little fun.” You snickered, the sound resounding inside the glass. “Plus, it’s not like you could change the Dissident decision anyway.”  
You saw him puff out his chest as you downed the rest of your drink, and you knew you’d won.  
“Meet me at IOI headquarters in a week, and if you can repair the technology I set in front of you I’ll allow Dissident Technology to reform.”  
You nodded, a confident smile on your lips. You tugged him close by his tie, pressed a kiss to his lips, and then pulled off your visor in the real world.  
~~~ Over at IOI headquarters  
F’Nale and several other board members entered Sorrento’s office to see their boss on his “throne" - as he called it, anyway. Lights flashed across his suit, but it was curious that, instead of red lights indicating combat, light blue swirled across the dark suit.  
And, F’Nale realized, the splotches of blue were vaguely hand-shaped.  
One blue splotch appeared on his shoulder, and the other bloomed on his left thigh. She watched as it moved slowly up his thigh and whirled around towards the other board members.  
“We’re obviously interrupting something. We should go, we can come back later.”  
The other board members hurriedly nodded and the group left.  
~~~  
After pulling the visor off, you took a moment to consider what you’d just done. You laughed to yourself, not even believing your courage with the man who’d shut you and your friends down.  
Speaking of which -  
You pulled up the group chat you had with them in the OASIS, and once the others were all there, you smiled.  
“Guys,” you said before anyone else could speak, “I think I just found a way to unfuck Dissident.”


	2. Chapter 2

Between then and the day Sorrento had decided you pulled as many IOI schematics as you could. Then, a week later, you met the other eight founders of Dissident near IOI HQ and the nine of you rolled in together  
“Alright ma’am, I’m going to need your ID and OASIS chip.”  
You handed her both, and smiled when you saw the orange sticky note on her desk bearing your name in hastily-scrawled Sharpie. Her eyes widened as she glanced between the sticky and the monitor and she finally looked up at you.  
“W-welcome, Ms. (y/n),” she said, and then looked at your co-founders as you stepped aside.  
“We’re her moral support,” the first said, smiling wolfishly as he held out his ID and chip to her.  
~~~  
You followed the security guard to a large common room that had a table set up in the middle. A crowd of IOI workers had formed a ring lining the walls of the room and surrounding the table, which had something covered in a cloth sitting on it.  
You stepped up to the table and locked eyes with Sorrento.  
“You’re (username),” he said, half question and half statement.  
“That’s me,” you said, and you watched him look you over and judge you. You quirked an eyebrow when he met your gaze again.  
You interlaced your fingers and cracked your knuckles. Behind him, you could hear your teammates snicker. “What’ve you got for me?” you asked.  
He pulled the cloth off of the gadget, and you burst out laughing. Over the IOI employees’ murmurs, you announced, “IOI Mark 3 OASIS goggles. Released in 2022, made of Mobius plastic, and came with - yup.”  
Sorrento placed the gloves (which were bulky enough that they looked like oven mitts) on the table.  
You pulled out a notepad and pen. “What’s wrong with the goggles?”  
“They won’t turn on.”  
“And the gloves?”  
“The left hand is glitchy in-game.”  
You wrote this down. When you looked back up at him, he made a gesture at the goggles.  
“Guess I’m getting started,” you said, picking up the goggles and immediately popping the screen off.  
Around you the crowd gasped.  
“You guys didn’t know these goggles could do this?” you asked. “They do - you just gotta be careful with the optic cable.”  
Pulling said cable through a hole in the plastic mounting of the goggles, you plugged a cable into a tiny pinhole. You ran a startup video and pressed your face to the seal of the goggles.  
Nothing.  
“Hm, looks like the power’s fucked,” you murmured, tugging at the thick cable coming from the screen.  
You pull the battery from where it’s clipped to the back of the screen, and cut back its wrapping.  
“Don’t try this at home,” you said to the gathered crowd, and pulled the cable out of the battery and then out of the screen.  
Luckily you’d salvaged as many cables as you could from the headsets Dissident simply couldn’t fix, and you looked at about eight different cables before finding the one you needed.  
You plugged both ends of the new cable into the battery and the screen, and then, after hesitating a moment, plugged the battery into an outlet on the workbench.  
You slid the cable back through the hole in the housing and snapped the screen back into place before pressing it against your face.  
This time when you ran the startup video the screen lit up. You jerked back from the screen - the Mark 3 screen was brighter than any of the models currently on the market, and certainly brighter than any models you’d used in the past couple of years.  
“Okay. Screen’s fixed,” you said, picking up the heavy glove. You slid your hand in, wiggling your fingers around to see -  
“Ow!”  
You pulled your hand out of the glove to see a bead of blood forming in the middle of your index finger.  
“I’ll have someone get you something for that,” Sorrento murmured, tilting his head at one of his assistants. When they returned, they held out a bandage. You ripped the packaging open and were confronted with a navy blue bandage with little teal “IOI”s dotted across it.  
“Oh, that’s so cute,” you said, peering at the pattern. You peeled the backing off and wrapped it around your finger.  
With that fixed, you attempted to flip the thick glove inside-out. When you wrestled the material into the way you wanted it, a broken wire (the one that stabbed you in the finger) confronted you from the index finger.  
“Geez, what were you doing with this glove?” you snickered, holding it up so the others could see the snapped wire.  
“Testing,” Sorrento said, loudly enough that the room could hear him.  
“Suuuuure,” you said, setting the glove back down and rolling your eyes. As with the goggles, you stripped the wire in the index finger and pulled more wire, a sewing kit, and your computer from your bag.  
You rewired the glove - the sensors since the Mark 2 used a special sort of wiring that you’d brought with you - and wirelessly connected them to your computer to recalibrate the one finger.  
Once you were sure the finger was back as it should be and the hand wasn’t randomly glitching, you slid it and the goggles across the table.  
Sorrento met your gaze across the table.  
“Meet me in the OASIS,” you said.  
You slid on your own Frankenstein-ed goggles and gloves and shimmered into the OASIS. On what seemed to be an infinite plane, marked only by glowing, red lines creating a grid on the floor.  
“I take it it works?”  
Sorrento’s avatar looked at you with those glowing orange eyes.  
“Well, my hand’s not glitching.”  
He lifted it to look at his avatar’s right hand.  
“And I can see you, so…” He sighed. “I suppose you’ve made it work.”  
You tilted your head. “I’m glad.”  
“I’ll draw up the official documents to reinstate Dissident Technology, and you should hear from Ohio in about a week.”  
You yanked off your goggles. “I’m sorry?”  
“You heard me.” He looked around. “I think you all heard me.”  
You whirled on your co-founders. “Did he say what I think he said?”  
Anita, one of the software wizards, nodded, a bright grin spreading across her face. “We’re back in business, thanks to you!”  
She hugged you tightly and you rocked back, still stunned.  
“It felt right,” you acknowledged. “Like it was what I should be doing.”  
You turned around and mouthed thank you at Sorrento, who was half-turned away from you dictating notes to an assistant. You caught his eye and he turned to see you, giving you a slight nod as you pressed a hand to your mouth and felt your eyes fill up with tears. Several more of your co-founders jumped on you and you broke eye contact with the CEO, hugging them back as they celebrated.  
The nine of you left IOI headquarters celebrating and jubilant.  
“This means we get to do classes again,” you murmured, a laugh breaking up your statement.  
“You mean, those of us who didn’t make it out before IOI jumped down our throats,” Andre said, slapping you on the back.  
“Shut up,” you said, smirking at him. “I only had 10 credits to go.”  
“Bastards,” Erin said, fluffing their short, golden hair. “But now we can finish things off properly.”  
“Fuck that, I’m going back to get my masters. Or my doctorate,” Anita said. “Catch me teaching at OTech.”  
Several of your co-founders cheered her declaration.  
“They’ll never get us to go away now,” you answered.


	3. Chapter 3

You did indeed get the official documents - all nine of you did - and you were re-registering at OTech soon enough.  
“What are you taking?” Erin asked, sitting across from you in a coffee shop on campus.  
“The two EE classes I need to be done with my degree, and then a sociology class and a European history class.”  
“Ooh,” they said, leaning on a hand.  
“You?”  
“I’m taking an accounting class, a statistics class, and a seminar class - basically, prominent coders come in and give a guest lecture each week.”  
“That sounds super cool,” you said. “I - ”  
Your goggles chirped, alerting you to an incoming call. “Sorry,” you murmured before slipping your goggles on.  
“(username).”  
You turned to see Sorrento’s avatar.  
Nerves began to bubble in your stomach. “Yes?”  
“Something’s happened. How soon can you arrive at IOI headquarters?”  
You felt your stomach turn. “I’m done with class for the day, but I don’t know when the next train arrives. I - I’ll be there as soon as I can.”  
He inclined his head towards you. “Good.”  
Then he disappeared into a million pixels.

You pulled off your goggles. “I’m so sorry, I was just summoned to IOI headquarters,” you said to Erin. “Apparently something’s ‘happened’.”  
“Oh,” they answered. “Yeah, go. Let me know when you’re back at your apartment?”  
“I will,” you assured them. “See you.”  
You hopped on the next train from OTech to IOI headquarters.  
“Hi,” you said to the receptionist, “I was asked to come by Mr. Sorrento?”  
You handed over your ID and OASIS chip, and quickly got a visitor’s pass. “Apparently, he wants you up in his office.”  
“I don’t know where that is,” you said, smiling awkwardly.  
She filled you in on the directions, and you made your way up.  
It was intimidating, you thought, and it matched the CEO from what rumors you’d heard. Isolated, elevated, and impenetrable.  
You knocked on the door to the office, perched awkwardly on the stairs.  
The door opened, and Sorrento looked you over.  
“You said something was wrong…?”  
“Come in,” he said, opening the door slightly wider, and you moved into the semi-dark office past him.  
“What happened?” you asked.  
He slid his hands into his pockets. “Nothing’s wrong, actually.”  
You placed a hand on your chest and let out a breath. “You had me worried. I thought something - ”  
“I just wanted to see you.”  
You whirled around. “I’m sorry?”  
His gaze was fixed on the floor as you stared at him, then he looked up and met your eyes before lowering them again..  
“I… wanted to see you,” he repeated, haltingly and not wanting to meet your gaze.  
You felt several emotions rush through you as you tried to think of what to say in response.  
“Ever since that night in the OASIS, when we met, I haven’t stopped thinking about you,” he said.  
You just watched him with wide eyes.  
“I… I don’t know what to say,” you answered. “Honestly, I’m flattered, I think, but - won’t it look wrong?”  
He tilted his head slightly as he looked at you.  
“You got Dissident struck down, a major ruling in the tech industry, and then now - out of the blue - you decide to have the decision reversed. Wouldn’t it look sketchy to suddenly be dating one of the founders of Dissident?”  
“You think I care?” he said, spreading his hands. “I own one of the biggest tech companies in this _country_ , if not the _world_. People respect me. People _fear_ me.”  
You felt your lips twist into a sad smile as a pain twisted your insides. “No, I don’t think you care,” you said. “And that’s just the point.”  
You saw his face go from assured confidence to confusion to shocked realization within the span of a few seconds. Dropping your gaze you shook your head and turned to leave.  
“(y/n) - ”  
There was a chirping noise from his wrist, and he looked down, irritation on his face. You took this opportunity to escape from the office and took the train home.

In his office Sorrento looked up from clearing out his notifications to see an empty office and a half-open door. He cursed at himself and stalked over to his OASIS chair. Sliding his visor on, he looked around for your username but couldn’t find it - a clear sign that you’d switched your settings to “invisible”. You didn’t want to be bothered.

On the train you shoved your goggles back into your bag. Hopefully the invisible setting would help keep things low for a while - you were, after all, still a student and you had other things to be worrying about.  
You wiped under your eyes and tried to calm your breathing down as you pulled your laptop from your bag and began researching for a paper. An email notification pinged in your earphones and you pulled up your mail client.  
_Students,  
Next class period we will be having IOI CEO and founder Nolan Sorrento giving a presentation on the business side of the tech world. Please be prepared to listen to his presentation and be ready to ask questions._

You felt your hands begin to shake. You slid your goggles on and contacted Anita:  
_ayooooooo: hey cutie_  
(y/u/n): hey boo  
could you take notes for me in EE412 tomorrow  
apparently Sorrento’s guest lecturing  
ayooooooo: sure  
what happened?  
(y/u/n): I got a call from the big boss himself  
said ‘something happened’  
nothing happened; he used me coming over to confess  
ayooooooo: confess what  
(y/u/n): lol sorry  
confess that he’s got feelings for me  
ayooooooo: damn okay  
what did you say?  
(y/u/n): I told him it probably wasn’t a good idea, what with the timing for Dissident and all  
ayooooooo: yeah probably for the best  
(y/u/n): I don’t think he understood what I meant - he said that people feared him  
ayooooooo: I mean yeah no shit  
he probably just thinks you’re afraid of people’s reactions  
to a possible relationship  
(y/u/n): yeah  
and so I told him I didn’t think he cared  
and then I walked out of his office  
ayooooooo: was there a dramatic scene?  
(y/u/n): lol no  
he got a notification on his watch  
I left when he was distracted  
ayooooooo: biiiiiiitch  
I see why you don’t wanna go to class  
yeah okay I’ll go. get me a mocha - that’s a damn early class  
(y/u/n): I accept your price XD 

That morning you carried a mocha towards the class and found Anita outside the classroom.  
“One mocha with whipped cream,” you told her, handing her the drink and sipping on your own.  
“Ugh, you’re the best,” she groaned, taking it from you and taking a long pull.  
You looked around at all of your classmates standing in the hallway, and as you watched Sorrento rounded the corner.  
“Uhp, gotta go.”  
You turned and ran.  
“(y/n)! Wait!”  
You hurried through the bookstore and out onto the quad. Hearing Sorrento’s voice put a rock in the pit of your stomach and left you feeling almost queasy.

_ayooooooo: did sorrento see you as you left?_  
(y/u/n): yep  
almost got to me  
but I ran thru the bookstore  
ayooooooo: yikes  
he seems kinda sad now :(  
bahahahaa but thtat’s not your problem  
(y/u/n): damn straight  
now take notes pls 

You get a couple of days’ worth of work done during the two hours that you’re supposed to be in class, and then your messenger pings again.

 

_ayooooooo: okay_  
so sorrento stopped me before I left and was asking about you.  
(y/u/n): yikes  
what did he want?  
ayooooooo: he wants to meet up with you again 

You laughed and typed your response.

_(y/u/n): we see how well that went last time_  
ayooooooo: lol  
so I’ll send you the notes I took  
check ur email 

You did, and found four pictures in an email from her.

_(y/u/n): thaaaaaaaaaaanks  
ayooooooo: np_

Settling in to a seat in the library, you put in earbuds and began to work.


	4. Chapter 4

As you were waiting for a file to upload to the dropbox, you got a ping that you’d recieved a new OASISmail message.  
You pulled your goggles on (though OTech had the latest OASIS glasses) and navigated to your mailbox.  
_NEW MESSAGE FROM: BO55MAN69_  
You felt your stomach drop.  
_Better get this over with now._  
You reached forward and guided the message towards you to open it.  
_Hello, (y/n), um…_  
His gaze was directed at the floor, and his hands were in his pockets. He sighed and then looked at the camera.  
_I don’t know what to say. I’ve been thinking about you said when you were, uh, here and…_  
He dropped his gaze and shook his head.  
_I guess I thought that being head of IOI made me untouchable, and I could extend that to you. But seeing you there with your friend, just in normal clothes -_  
He laughed, still not looking at the camera.  
_\- it made me realize that you are_ just _a college student for the moment._  
He shook his head and was silent for a moment. Then he looked up towards the camera again.  
_I understand if you never want to talk to me again. But if you do, well… you know where I am._  
He gave a sort-of smile to the camera and a little nod.

You paused in your schoolwork and stared off into the distance for a moment. Then, shoving everything into your backpack, you raced for the train and hurried towards Dissident headquarters.  
“Whoa, who lit your pants on fire?” one of your teammates asked, but you were too busy hurrying to your bench and plugging your manual soldering iron in.  
“I have - uh - a thing. Gotta do it.”  
You gave them a decisive nod, and the three of them present poured into the brainstorming room.  
You pulled out a blank circuit board and clacked your nails against it, thinking to the rhythm you made. Then you ripped off a sheet of butcher paper and began to scribble plans on it.  
Finally, hours later, you were done. You slid your steampunk-style goggles onto your forehead and blew a final breath across the back of the circuit board.  
You walked over towards the front of the workshop, pulling a sheet of bubble wrap and a shipping box. You carefully wrapped the circuit board you’d made and secured the final flap in place with a strip of packing tape. Then, you placed it in the shallow shipping box and intertwined the flaps.  
You took another piece of butcher paper and scrawled a note on it. Then, you pulled out your goggles and requested a delivery drone.  
When the drone arrived, you programmed the IOI headquarters in on its touchscreen and placed the box in its graspers. Then you hit “OK” and sent it off.

The sleek glass sliding door whirred as it slid aside and Melindra stopped as she saw the package on the doormat. It was slightly damp from the light rain, and she picked it up as she saw the name on the top (albeit it was bleeding slightly).

There was a knock on the Nest door.  
“Yes?”  
“Mr. Sorrento, I was just on my way out when I found a package left on the front mat.”  
“Someone must’ve used a delivery bot,” he sniffed. “Did you run it through the scanner?”  
“Yes, and it seems to only be a circuit board,” Melindra murmured. “And I think there’s a note.”  
Sorrento’s eyebrows furrowed. “Let me see.”  
The tape was what first clued him in - it was printed with green DISSIDENT TECH while the box was a standard shipping box. Sorrento moved over to his desk and pulled out a slightly sharp letter opener and slit the tape.  
The note was on the same paper as the name on the top, which simply read SORRENTO in bleeding black marker. This note, however, was written neatly in blue pen.

_Sorrento, (or should I call you Nolan? I don’t know : > )_

Sorrento huffed a laugh at the little bird face next to the salutation.

_I got your message. I… don’t know what to say, either. I will say the attention is flattering, but I don’t know how I feel just yet. (But I’m not ruling anything out ;) )_

He was slightly taken aback at the winky face. It was refreshing, though, he usually only received official reports in the most formal language.

_So, rambling aside, what I guess I want to say is that we should meet up - IRL, I mean - something casual and hidden like coffee or something. Just let me know._

01001001 00100000 01101000 01101111 01110000 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01110011 01101111 01101111 01101110 00101110  <3

_-(y/n)_

Sorrento shook his head and sat down to translate the binary. Boy had it been a while since he’d written a note in code.  
And then there was the matter of the heart next to it…

Reaching into the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet, Nolan pulled out a pad of paper that had a little robot in the lower right hand corner. Making sure there was no one coming up to the office, he pulled out a pen of his own and wrote out:

01001101 01100101 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00101110 00100000 00111100 00110011

plus a few coordinates, also written in binary.  
Then, once he was done, he replaced the pad of paper and folding the note. He placed an adhesive digital rune on it so that only the designated recipient could open it, then walked into his private storage room. He searched along the shelves and found an old robot he’d made when he was working for Halliday as an intern, and booted it up.  
Outside in the rain he released the robot with the note in its claws.

 

You looked up from your desk when there was a tapping at the front window. There, sitting on a branch outside the front door of the workshop, was a robotic bird holding a note in its claws.  
You went outside and it blinked at you before holding up its leg. You took the note and it flew away.

You opened the note, saw the robots around the edge, and smiled.


End file.
